Anthony Powell - The Valley of Bones

‘It’s just the way you look at it,’ Moreland had said. ‘I know Matilda, for instance, would take the line that no woman was worth a moment’s consideration unless she were capable of making a man neglect his duty. Barnby, on the other hand, would say no duty was worth a moment’s consideration if it forced you to neglect women. These things depend so much on the subjective approach.’

I wondered if Gwatkin had seen the film too, and memorized that scrap of dialogue as a sentiment which appealed to him. On the whole it was unlikely that the picture, comparatively highbrow, had penetrated so deep in provincial distribution. Probably Gwatkin had simply elaborated the idea for himself. It was a high-minded, hut not specially original one. Widmerpool, for example, when involved with Gypsy Jones, had spoken of never again committing himself with a woman who took his mind from his work. Gwatkin rarely spoke of his own wife. He had once mentioned that her father was in bad health, and, if he died, his mother-in-law would have to come and live with them.

‘What are you going to do about Pendry?’ I asked.

‘Arrange for him to have some leave as soon as possible. I’m afraid that will deprive you of a platoon sergeant.’

‘Pendry will have to go on leave sooner or later in any case. Besides, he’s not much use in his present state.’

‘The sooner Pendry goes, the sooner he will bring all this trouble to a stop.’

‘If he can.’

Gwatkin looked at me with surprise.

‘Everything will come right when he gets back home,’ he said.

‘Let’s hope so.’

‘Don’t you think Pendry will be able to deal with his wife?’

‘I don’t know anything about her.’

‘You mean she might want to go off with this other man?’

‘Anything might happen. Pendry might do her in. You can’t tell.’

Gwatkin hesitated a moment.

‘You know that Rudyard Kipling book the other night?’

‘Yes.’

‘There are sort of poems at the beginning of the stories.’

‘Yes?’

‘One of them always stuck in my head — at least bits of it. I can never remember all the words of anything like that.’

Gwatkin stopped again. I feared he thought he had already said too much, and was not going to admit the verse of his preference.

‘Which one?’

‘It was about — was it some Roman god?’

‘Oh, Mithras.’

‘You remember it?’

‘Of course.’

‘Extraordinary.’

Gwatkin looked as if he could scarcely credit such a mental feat.

‘As you said, Rowland, it’s my profession to read a lot. But what about Mithras?’

‘Where it says “Mithras also a soldier—”’

Gwatkin seemed to think that sufficient clue, that I must be able to guess by now all he hoped to convey. He did not finish the line.

‘Something about helmets scorching the forehead and sandals burning the feet. I can’t imagine anything worse than marching in sandals, especially on those cobbled Roman roads.’

Gwatkin disregarded the logistic problem of sandal-shod infantry. He was very serious.

‘ “—keep us pure till the dawn”,’ he said.

‘Oh, yes.’

‘What do you make of that?’

‘Probably a very necessary prayer for a Roman legionary.’

Again, Gwatkin did not laugh.

‘Does that mean women?’ he asked, as if the notion had only just struck him.

‘I suppose so.’

I controlled temptation to make flippant suggestions about other, more recondite vices, for which, with troops of such mixed origin as Rome’s legions, the god’s hasty moral intervention might be required. That sort of banter did not at all fit in with Gwatkin’s mood. Equally pointless, even hopelessly pedantic, would be a brief exegesis explaining that the Roman occupation of Britain, historically speaking, was rather different from the picture in the book. At best one would end up in an appalling verbal tangle about the relationship of fact and poetry.

‘Those lines make you think,’ said Gwatkin slowly.

‘About toeing the line?’

‘Make you glad you’re married,’ he said. ‘Don’t have to bother any more about women.’

He turned back towards the place where we had first met. There was the sound of a car further up the road. The truck came into sight again. Gwatkin abandoned further speculations about Mithras. He became once more the Company Commander.

‘We’ve talked so much I haven’t inspected your platoon position,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing special I ought to see there?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Bring your men right away to the place I showed you on the map. We’ve got some farm buildings for a billet tonight. It’s not far from here. Everyone will have a bit of a rest. Nothing much expected of us until midday tomorrow All right?’

‘All right.’

He climbed into the truck. It drove off again. I returned to the platoon. Sergeant Pendry came forward to report. He looked just as he had looked that morning; no better, no worse.

‘Captain Gwatkin just had a word with me about your leave, Sergeant. We’ll arrange that as soon as the exercise is over.’

‘Thank you very much, sir.’

He spoke tonelessly, as if the question of leave did not interest him in the least.

‘Fall the platoon in now. We’re billeted in a farm near here. There’s prospect of some sleep.’

‘Right, sir.’

As usual, the distance to march turned out further than expected. Rain came on again. However, the farm buildings were pretty comfortable when we arrived. The platoon was accommodated in a thatched barn where there was plenty of straw. Corporal Gwylt, as always, was unwilling to believe that agricultural surroundings could ever be tolerable.

‘Oh, what nasty smells there are here,’ he said. ‘I do not like all these cows.’

I slept like a log that night. It must have been soon after breakfast the following morning, when I was checking sentry duties with Sergeant Pendry, that Breeze hurried into the barn to issue a warning.

‘A staff car flying the Divisional Commander’s pennon has just stopped by the road,’ Breeze said. ‘It must be a snap inspection by the General. Rowland says get all the men cleaning weapons or otherwise usefully occupied forthwith.’

He rushed off to warn Kedward. I set about generating activity in the barn. Some of the platoon were at work removing mud from their equipment. Those not so obviously engaged on a useful task were found other commendable occupations. All was in order within a few minutes. This was not a moment too soon. There was the sound of a party of people approaching the barn. I looked out, and saw the General, his ADC and Gwatkin slopping through the mud of the farmyard.

‘They’re coming, Sergeant Pendry.’

They entered the barn. Sergeant Pendry called those assembled to attention. It was at once obvious that General Liddament was not in the best of tempers. He was a serious looking man, young for his rank, cleanshaven, with the air of a scholar rather than a soldier. His recent taking over of the Division’s command was already to be noticed in small matters of routine. Though regarded by regular soldiers as something of a military pedant — so Maelgwyn-Jones had told Gwatkin — General Liddament was said to be an officer with ideas of his own. Possibly in order to counteract this reputation for an excessive precision in approach to his dudes, an imperfection of which he was probably aware and hoped to correct, the General allowed himself certain informalities of dress and turn-out. For example, he carried a long stick, like the wand of a verger in a cathedral, and wore a black-and-brown check scarf thrown carelessly about his neck. A hunting horn was thrust between the buttons of his battle-dress blouse. Maelgwyn-Jones also reported that two small dogs on a lead sometimes accompanied General Liddament, causing great disturbance when they squabbled with each other. Today must have been too serious an occasion for these animals to be with him. The presence of dogs would have increased his air of being a shepherd or huntsman, timeless in conception, depicted in the idealized pastoral scene of some engraving. However, General Liddament’s manner of speaking had none of this mild, bucolic tone.